


Pillow Talk, Clown Haunts

by InsominiacArrest



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Airports, F/F, Halloween, Horror Comedy, light on the horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-09
Updated: 2016-10-09
Packaged: 2018-08-20 12:13:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8248406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsominiacArrest/pseuds/InsominiacArrest
Summary: Thought I’d try my hand at a lapidot Halloween-based story in the form of a horror-comedy, very light on horror.Lapis is stuck at an airport at 5 am and rumors of one of those freaky clowns in the area abounds, she comes back to a stranger, Peridot, sleeping on her pillow. They go from there.





	

Airports at 5 am are like seedless cherries that almost resemble grapes, a little unnerving. An airport at 5 am on Halloween on the other hand, was like something out of a Stephen King novel that everyone tried to collectively ignore since they agreed he might be Losing His Touch.

Lapis sat in her crowded bay, surrounded by an overstuffed suitcase, one knotted-purse hanging on by a shoestring, a pillow in a raggedy pillowcase meant for travel and two empty water bottles.

The bay was absolutely jam-packed, over 30 flights out of Newark had been delayed because of a thunderstorm and crying babies and anxious figures hung around like ghosts in an anxiety mist.

Lapis kept rubbing at her eyes and shifting from side to side, she had finished two bottles of water in under an hour.

She glanced around for the boarding signal to finally get in and maybe pack away her things so she wouldn’t worried about the nearby soccer mom jacking her laptop.

She bites her lip and tries not listen to the water flowing outside. She could do this, she could hold it.

Someone drops their water bottle next to her, Lapis’s eyes go wide.

“Fuck.”

She glances at the girl dressed as a witch next to her, Lapis makes a face a strange display but taps her on the shoulder.

“Hey,” Lapis may or may not be literally shaking at that moment, “Could you watch my stuff while I go to the bathroom?”

The blonde woman in a pointy witch’s hat blinks at her, there were dark circles under her eyes imprinted like rain clouds under her blonde eyelashes. She yawns.

“What?”

“Uh, I know this is weird, but could you watch my stuff?”

She looks her up and down, “Uh, sure.” The woman seems to see her for the first time, “Yeah.”

Lapis pats her on the shoulder and dashes up, “thanks!” She squeaks and starts running down the broad halls, past the Starbucks and magazine racks telling her about ‘Want Good Glutes? No Problem! Go Gluten Free.’

Lapis had a fantasy about a water tower bursting. It takes her ten minutes to run the entire airport to find a restroom without a line longer than her aunt’s list of complaints about her bunions.

She sighs in relief when she dashes into a stall, feeling like the drunk girl at the party who had Too Much. She waits with a happy hum until she hears a couple of voices in front of her.

“Do you think this will be much longer?” It was a teenager with her hair tied up and cheerleader costume. Why were people dressed up?

“God I hope not, everyone is saying one of those weirdo’s was inspired by the recent clown junk is running round.”  
  
Lapis straightens up and listens.

“Clown junk?” The other one questions and Lapis stomach tightens.

Lapis imagines the other girl nodding, “Yeah, like on all those campuses, some freak is wondering around in a clown costume and the airport doesn’t want to start a panic.”

“Oh my god, what a shit show, let’s…” Their voices drift away as they exit the room, Lapis dry-swallows.

“Well damn.” She finishes up and takes her time washing her hands. Of course, the end of her shitty European vacation included clowns, that must the default setting of her circumstances.

She looks around, realizing she was the last one in this far-off restroom and hightails it out of there. She wasn’t going to be the first clown-related body found.

She makes her way back to her bay slowly, the steady rain beats against the giant airport windows and Lapis makes a deal with the future ghost of Stephen King to not make an ass of the situation.

She was distracted by her own thoughts of the movie It (which was actually an alien?) when she spots her stuff. And the girl watching it had cushioned her head on Lapis’s traveling pillow.

“Uh!” Lapis touches her chest in offense, “what the hell.”

She was drooling on her pillow while leaning on her suitcase, fast asleep. _Who did that?_

Lapis approaches the situation tactfully, on one hand she was decidedly asleep and this was awkward, on the other hand, _who does this?_

Lapis sighs and sits down next to her, examining the imprint like bruises under the other girl’s eyes. She was too obviously exhausted. “Alright, enjoy that, pillow-thief.” She scoffs and watches her sleep slowly.

Lapis’s eyes start aching at 5:45 and she decides enough is enough, the girl was softly snoring, sleeping through a literal baby practicing its opera. Lapis wasn’t going to suffer through that alone.

She pokes in the cheek, “Hey, hey, kiddo.” She shakes her shoulder. “Don’t you have your own junk to drool on?”  
  
The girl finally blinked open her acid green eyes, she yawns, “It’s Peridot,” She says through the yawn.

“Well, whatever it is, this isn’t actually good airport etiquette.”

Peridot jumps at that and looks around, examining the pillow she had been resting on, “Oh! Shit, I didn’t…Ugh, I thought that was mine.” She shakes her head, and Lapis snorts.

“Well,” she scratches the back of her neck, “I mean, still rude but…I’m Lapis.” She wasn’t going to be like ‘it’s alright,’ she just introduces herself instead.

They shake hands and Peridot wipes at her face, “Sorry. I guess 12 hours without sleep can catch up to you.” She didn’t meet her eye.

“Rough flight?”  
  
“Nah,” She rubs her hands together, “I just can’t sleep on planes.”  
  
Lapis nods, “I like your costume.”  
  
Peridot gives her a small smile, “Thanks.”  
  
They share a strange look and then whispering erupts around them, the word ‘clown’ was thrown around.

Lapis rolls her eyes, Peridot glances at her, “I miss something?” She asks, “Clowns?”  
  
She heaves a sigh, “Don’t worry about it, people get freaked out over nothing.”

A dash of lightning streaks through the sky outside, illuminating the room like a strobe light, Lapis holds her breath, a shock of thunder follows and she jumps.

A staticy buzz wrinkles the air and the lights flicker on and then off.

“Oh come on.” Lapis is the first one to say as the passengers stand in a shocked awe. The power was out.

The crowd starts out murmuring and then snowballs into a surge towards the help desk to demand what happened in a dull roar.

“Everyone!” The desk woman puts her hands up, “Stay calm, the airport has temporarily lost power, please stay calm while the backup generator comes on.”

Workers try to soothe the anxious crowd, now fully yelling about clowns. Lapis groans, “Of course, of course.”  
  
A small hand pokes her shoulder, “Hey,” the soft voice of the girl next to her greets, “this is like a joke, right? Power goes out on Halloween, no one believes that.” The girls hands her shaking every so slightly.

Lapis puts her hands on her shoulder, “Absurdist comedy, you got it.”  
  
They chuckle in the dark, people breathing in tandem in the waiting space like a surge of warm air.

Lapis can feel herself almost huddling with the people next to her like penguins with no sense of personal space.

Lapis listens to a boy scout tell the rest of his troop about a ghost-mime attack, they called bullshit on him and Peridot and Lapis played cards in the light of one of their cell phones.

“Okay, do you have any queens?”  
  
Peridot snorted, “I wish.”  
  
Lapis laughed a surprised sound in the dark, “Do you have any clowns?” Lapis winks and Peridot studies her cards.

“Hey, don’t joke, my mom was a clown and father was run over by a clown in a tractor.”  
  
Lapis raises an eyebrow, and blinks, she had said it completely deadpan, “Really?”  
  
Peridot stuck her tongue out by the low light. “No.”

Lapis pushed on her shoulder with a brief laugh, “For someone who let the hoover dam out on my pillow, you’re not bad.”  
  
“I said sorry!” They argue a little as Lapis gave Peridot her five and they collected cards.

Peridot was coming home from South Africa, a 19 hour flight that had ruined her, and they both heading down to South Carolina on one last flight.

Lapis was going to ask her if she was in college, or in work, or wanted to get into her pants when a shriek pierced the air.

“Ah!” A female yelp echoed down the wide hallways, “There he is!” 

“What?”

“Clown!”

Chaos broke out, Lapis grabbed onto Peridot’s hand.  
  
“We’re gonna die.” She says as people start running the opposite direction, the two of them hold hands as they freeze in place on the ground.

“Do they take virgin sacrifices?” Peridot’s eyes were wide, “Ohgod, ohgod.”

“Virgin?” Lapis was confused.

“That’s who they murder, with their clown senses.”

Lapis smashes their mouths together. A rough kiss in the dark as the inevitable clown came to freak them out with its terrible horn-chainsaw or something.

“There!” Lapis cries out as she wildly kissed her again and Peridot shook her head.

“That’s not the same thing!”   
  
Lapis was about to open her mouth to scold her for being a choosy beggar when a figure materializes at the far end of the bay. Pale, in a baggy outfit, a bright nose and an unsteady gait.

“Ah!” They shriek and Lapis considers how to chuck her metal water bottle at its head. They grab onto each other and people streak in the opposite direction.

Lapis squeezes her eyes shut, the buzz erupts, the lights flicker on.

A collective sigh comes from the crowd who peaked around from the corners.

“Dear patrons,” the speakers projects a young friendly voice, “Power is officially restored, thank you for your patience and apologize for the inconvenience… We would like to announce furthermore, that security has confirmed that there are no clowns on the premises. If you could please return to your luggage, boarding can begin again shortly.”  
  
Lapis exhaled and looked around, the misty figure was gone and Lapis felt more ridiculous than the time she said ‘you too’ to the person asking her how she was.

She looks at her hand, it was still clutching at a strangers fingers, they let go quickly.

“So,” Lapis looks at the now lit ceiling, she coughs, “Wow.”

“The mind is a terrible thing.” Peridot grumbles back like a clinical psychologist.

They blush and look anywhere but at each other and Lapis considers going into the thunderstorm and lying down in the downpour.

They stand up as boarding finally starts again, Peridot elbows her, “Thanks for making me‘not a virgin’.”

Lapis groans and shields her face, “Don’t remind me. I need to go drink that off.”  
  
“Hey!” Peridot poked her, “Cheer up, it was a nice gesture.”  
  
“Don’t push it shortie.” They hobble down the walkway carrying all of their luggage.

They find out they go to the same university. “If you ever want to go pumpkin carving.” Peridot was blushing as Lapis was about to go find her seat, “My hall is throwing a pumpkin carving party.”  
  
Lapis studies her, looking the girl dressed up as a witch up and down, she tugs her hat down and kisses her nose playfully, “Sure. Carve me a new pillow.”

”Oh come one.”  
  
She gives her her number.


End file.
